Historic First IMS Lap

Welcome to the first lap around the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Appropriately enough, this took place in May 1909 and one of the cars was the same make as the world's first pace car: Stoddard Dayton and it was driven by the visionary who made the track possible: Carl Graham Fisher. Stoddard Dayton was one of the featured marques sold at Fisher's dealership, the Fisher Automobile Company.
 
Two other cars were Overlands, manufactured in Indianapolis. The Overland brand was known for its hill climbing performance as well as agility on the craggy terrain that passed for roads in the era.
 
The news reports indicate the track was far from finished. Engineer P.T. Andrews discovered the creek at the south end of the grounds and required containment with tunneling under the track and moving the water to the far end of the property.
 
At times Fisher and the others had to get out push their machines - or so the story goes. The mad rush to prepare the Speedway for its inaugural races was underway. Fisher and the co-founders planned a national championship balloon event to begin recovering their investment. They still harbored hopes of staging their first auto races in mid-July.
 
That was excessively optimistic when you consider that even the mid-August dates for the initial motorcycle and auto races were ill-advised and ended in death and injury. Carl Fisher was a risk taker and expected those who worked with him to share that aggressiveness.
 
Click thru and go on that historic first lap in an oh-so-different age...